


Some Comfort

by CrystalMage



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Friendship/Love, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-04
Updated: 2015-02-04
Packaged: 2018-03-10 10:55:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3287663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrystalMage/pseuds/CrystalMage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ichabod stared at the table before him, eyes tracing the grooves and whorls of the wood on the surface. In his lap, his fingers stretched out, retracting into fists, and spreading out again over his knees. Though he had never considered himself a violent man, he found himself wondering whether a firm grip on the edge of the table could result in an upending of the solid frame…</p>
            </blockquote>





	Some Comfort

Ichabod stared at the table before him, eyes tracing the grooves and whorls of the wood on the surface. In his lap, his fingers stretched out, retracting into fists, and spreading out again over his knees. 

Though he had never considered himself a violent man, he found himself wondering whether a firm grip on the edge of the table could result in an upending of the solid frame. The heavy oak would not crack, of that he was certain, but perhaps it would disrupt the bookcase… send it crashing down into a nearby window, the glass shattering into a thousand tiny pieces onto the porch. It would take absolutely nothing to tear the curtains from the windows, the rip of the fabric ringing through the room as it cascaded down to the ground. Perhaps it might even land near the fireplace…

“Crane?”

Ichabod shook violently out of his thoughts, coming back to the unaltered state of the room. He raised his eyes carefully to the Lieutenant who was standing a few feet from his chair, her brow knitted in a questioning angle, one hand reaching out to him.

He cleared his throat and the noise was loud in the quiet of the cabin. He realized everything seemed significantly quieter without the roar of blood pounding in his head.

“Miss Mills, I apologize. You caught me in a reverie.”

The Lieutenant’s face slackened into an expression that held little belief of his weak excuse. 

“Crane, the last time I saw a look like that in someone’s eyes, I was getting a call from one of Jenny’s exes not an hour later, crying about the brand new dents all over his shiny Mustang.”

She walked carefully towards him, her movements slow and obvious. His hands clenched again in his lap and she stopped just before him, leaning to rest her hip on the table he had been so viciously plotting against just moments before. She was hardly that much taller than him standing when he was seated, but there was a clear authority in the way she held his gaze. 

“So,” she stretched the word out, the sound echoing in his head. “You wanna talk about why you looked so ready to flip a damn table?”

Ichabod felt his mouth drop and his cheeks flared with heat. Had his fellow Witness been studying the art of Telepathy in the archives? He would hardly be shocked if he had missed such studies, his mind having been consumed elsewhere…

Her face lit up with a shocked grin. “Wait, were you really gonna try to flip that table?”

Ichabod’s mouth opened and closed for an embarrassing minute, his flush rising once more. “Lieutenant-“

She glanced thoughtfully at the table over her shoulder. “You know that thing weighs about 5 times as much as your skinny British butt, right?”

“Lieutenant, I-“

“…I mean, this isn’t even your house for you to be breaking any furniture anyway…”

“Miss Mills, I assure you-“

“…were you planning on leaving a note at least, or…?”

“Miss Mills, please!”

She looked over at him then, a mischievous grin on her face. “I bet it would’ve made a hell of a mess though.”

The breath Ichabod was holding came out in a rush. He closed his eyes and allowed himself a bitter grin. “The resounding cacophony alone would have been worth the effort.” He opened his eyes and looked up to her, but the mirth drained from her face as he watched, and he looked away. He did not want her pity.

“Crane-“

“Miss Mills, I will not be causing any harm to Sheriff Corbin’s home tonight. You may return to your apartment to rest, confident in the structural integrity of this domicile.”

“Crane, I didn’t come here to check on the cabin, I came here to check on you.”

“Lieutenant,” he straightened his back, steadying his voice and leveled her with look. “I am fine.”

She only stared at him, her eyes liquid in the glow of the candlelight.

His gaze dropped down to his lap, willing his hands out of fists to lay flat on the tops of his thighs. “Katrina made her decisions. And I in turn needed to make mine.”

Saying it out loud was painful. Speaking of her in the past tense was painful. Knowing the truth of it was painful. The circumstances behind it all were enraging. 

Ichabod closed his eyes against the wave of anger that ran through him, drawing in breath until it filled his lungs completely, then blowing it out in one long sustained exhale…

He sensed the aura of her presence first, then the thrill of warmth as her hands ran over him, one across his shoulders and the other ghosting across his chest. She laced her fingers together and cupped his shoulder in her joined palms, then pulled him in, throwing him off center with a strong tug. His arms pin-wheeled briefly as his head landed softly on her collarbone and she squeezed him into her side.

Ichabod’s face was on fire in an instant, and he would no doubt set her skin ablaze with the heat in his cheeks alone. His chest was pressed against the curve of her body, his forehead nestled into her neck, and his nose pointing down giving him quite a generous view of-

“Miss Mills!”

She chuckled and her body moved with her, his head bobbing along for the ride. After multiple burials Ichabod could not imagine ever again so desperately wishing for the earth to swallow him whole, and yet here he was. Adding further misery, the awkward angle was only causing him to sink further against her tiny form as he actively avoided touching any other part of her to use as leverage for setting an appropriate distance.

“Miss Mills,” his voice was shaky with shock and this seemed to set off another chuckle which was precisely the last thing he needed. “Miss Mills, what are you doing?”

“It’s called a hug, Crane.”

“I’ve experienced one of yours hugs, Miss Mills, this is distinctly-“

“Ichabod.” 

Her tone quieted him and he held his breath.

“It’s just a hug.” He opened his mouth to argue, but she spoke again. “I’m sorry about everything that happened. With Katrina. And with Abraham.” 

Ichabod froze in her grasp, the pain and anger and humiliation battling inside him. He was deciding on the most polite way to disentangle himself from her and ask her to leave him be, but her voice continued, rumbling under his cheek.

“I hate that you’re feeling this way. And I hate that I can’t fix it.” 

His eyes fluttered close, his lashes brushing against her chest, and he felt her squeeze his shoulders tighter. 

“But,” she continued, and he could see her mouth move in his mind’s eye, partnering with the vibrations he felt beneath him. “I can give you a hug. And I can tell you that things feel like shit right now, but you’re going to be fine.” Her thumbs rubbed slightly against his shoulder, her fingers flexing around his bicep. “You’re going to be fine.” 

The fight drained out of him completely. The aggression, the viciousness, the anger – it dissipated in an instant and left him exhausted. His arms were a heavy weight and he let one fall loosely onto his lap, while the other he very gently placed at the small of her back. His fingers created an arc across her spine, feeling the muscles on either side tense and brace. It felt to him that his hand could span the entirety of her waist, and yet she held him firm and strong without wavering. Her voice was steel and he squeezed his eyes tight. Ichabod sent up a silent prayer of gratitude to the fates that had brought this figure of courage and fire into his life. By his side. At this point, quite literally.

“Abbie…”

She says nothing, only bringing him impossibly closer to her side.

He lifts his hands slowly to rest on her hip, wrapping his arms around her waist tentatively. Here, clutching to her like a drowning man clings to the shore, he wants to believe. He should not believe her when she tells him things will be alright. He cannot see how it could be. But he is broken and weak and he wants so desperately to believe…

“You weren’t really going to flip that table though, right?”

The chuckle bursts out of him of its own accord and he feels her respond in kind. She is the light. He understands that now. The beacon in the torrential storm. The warm glow assuring him of safety at the end of an ominous road. The dawn in the distance that beckons him forward and through the darkness.

He allows himself the briefest impropriety to tilt his nose into her skin. Above him she shifts and he feels the soft weight of her cheek resting on the crown of his head. Her frame surrounds him and he cannot imagine feeling safer than he does in that moment. He breathes in her scent, and smiles. 

Perhaps he will believe her.

**Author's Note:**

> There are some turbulent waters out there right now, so I needed something soothing with these two. (Also: first posting to AO3, yay!)


End file.
